They don’t like people, those customs officers, that’s the first thing to remember when dealing with customs, they are like retail workers who never get a break and everyone knows that a retail worker is never happy.

 But the thing about retail workers is that if the boss isn’t looking, they can ignore the big pack that may or may not have products that they haven’t paid for in there.

In customs if they don’t check those packs and somehow something dangerous gets on that flight, then you can bet that eventually it will get back to the customs officer who let them through, and that means bye bye for that officer.

I think what everyone needs to remember is that being customs officer would have to be the worst job in the world. For a start they are always in the airport, but they never get to fly anywhere and the airports are always open. They have to talk with people from all over the world (that’s a bit of a good and a bad point), they have to stop people who look dodgy and check them, the passports have to be right, and if they aren’t, they have to tell the people that they can’t actually travel anywhere because they stupidly forgot their visas.

Keeping that in mind I would like to offer this one piece of advice, please if you only remember one thing from this article, then let this be it. Be nice to customs officers.

They have got, like mentioned, one of the worst jobs in the world, and really your politeness will make them more receptive to you and more helpful. Personally I have never worked as a customs officer but I do have a day job in retail and it’s the same principle.

When working, if people look at me like I am dirt under their nose, and still expect me to be helpful to them, or if people start loud arguments with me about price, well, to be honest I almost go out of my way not to help them. But the ones that actually have a smile and address me politely I go out of my way to help them. Sure you are supposed to treat all customers equally, but really would you want to help the person who is being a complete idiot to you just because they can?

So remember that when going up to the customs officer.

Another tip when going up to that final window – have your passport out, open it up to your photo page and put your landing or exited card slotted above it. Keep it open and hand it over to the customs officer as soon as you get called.

You are told repeatedly by the guards standing around customs to have your passport open to the right page, sometimes they yell it over the crowd again and again to get their message heard. But people still, and it usually tends to be the person in front of you, don’t do such a thing and as such it holds up the entire line.

Customs officers will love you forever if you do such a simple thing. Just remember, they have a never ending line backed up behind you and imagine how bad it could be if you have to sit, wait and do the same thing over and over again, something that could be avoided if the people coming up to your window had simply listened.

Stay behind the yellow line

Your passport is your one worldwide identity card and you need it. The yellow line was invented so that the only people who see your passport is you and the customs officer. It was invented so you don’t have someone standing incredibly close behind you, breathing down your neck just staring at the most valuable thing that you own.

So listen to the guards and the signs littered around the line and stay behind the yellow line, it’s for your privacy as much as everyone else’s.

Don’t make faces at the guards

Seems like a fairly basic idea, but it’s telling about human kind in general how many people ignore such a simple thought. But if you don’t want to get on the plane and get away from your hometown then by all means pull faces at them, it’s the fastest way there is to get pulled out of the line and strip searched.

If you do it in America when then you can even say goodbye to coming home for a long while, those guards definitely don’t muck around.

The customs line is long

It’s always going to be long. Accept that, because odds are after travelling the world and always having to queue in the longest line because you aren’t a local, the second you get home and you are a local, the local line will be the longest. Because that’s just the way the world works.

Expect a long line, bring out a book to read or just people watch, nothing will make the line go faster and glaring at the customs officer will make sure they only go that much slower, just to spite you.

Make sure you fill out your landing/exiting cards properly

If you get it wrong they could make you go get another one and fill it out properly, thus having to start the line all over again. You have to sign it, date it, and make sure you aren’t doing anything that you shouldn’t be doing. Handing over the correctly filled out card will get you though that customs line that much faster.

Customs Officers don’t care

It’s true. They don’t care where you are going, where you have been or what sort of sob story you have for them. They just want you out of their window so they can put the next person through and hopefully get to lunch that much faster. Know that, embrace it and move on and you won’t have a problem with the customs officers.

Now customs is a necessity that every traveller has to go through at least once in every new country that they enter into. It doesn’t have to be a hassle, just remember, you want to get out of there quickly and the customs officer wants you gone just as quickly.

Have you got any tips to help new travellers deal with customs? Share them below.

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Every traveller must encounter an airport at some point, for Aussies/Kiwis/Japanese and a few other island nations around the world; you have to go to airport to leave the country.

But as every traveller knows, airports are very boring. The sooner you accept that, the sooner you can move on and find ways to make them less boring.

If this is your first airport, say goodbye to the family/friends and go through customs nicely, read How To Deal With Customs (which will be uploaded on Friday) for tips to how to avoid not making it through, and head into the big waiting area.

You are now in the waiting area either for your first plane, or the next one. About two seconds will pass and then you will no doubt feel the creeping feeling of boredom invade your mind.

Unless you like shopping, if that’s true than you really don’t need to read this guide, you are totally set. You could watch all the planes take off, but if you are a nervous flyer  then watching the planes take off will only make it a lot worse.

So how do you deal with the boredom that is slowly overtaking your mind?

Go exploring

This may only last for ten minutes if you are in a really small airport, but it gets your legs moving and you want to keep as active as you can until you have to sit down on that plane in those stupid little seats for hours at a time.

Find Food

You may not be hungry now, but you will be after you see the disgusting meal that you have as your only nutrition when on the plane. Get sugar, it will hype you up and everything will seem a lot more funny and less boring.

Sneak Into An Airport Lounge

You’ve forget your card or I thought this was the bathroom are two good excuses to use to get into an airport lounge, as long as you put on the I’m A Stupid Idiot face. Or maybe the person in front of you mistakenly thinks that you are one of them, and they end up holding the door open for you.

You may not be totally successful and end up being kicked out, but hey, at least it will eat up some time. Just be very careful with this, you don’t actually want to get kicked out of the airport itself.

You have simply walked into the wrong room if you get questioned about it; and if in real trouble, turn on the waterworks or the idiot look.

Talk to Someone

If your gate is open and there are a bunch of people waiting around already, strike up a conversation with one of them. Or annoy them, either one should keep your mind off how long it still is before you even get on the plane.

Buy a deck of cards.

I got mine in my very first airport and they have followed me all around the world since. The fold down tray in the planes are a little too small to play a really good game of solitaire, but you can make do.

When sitting in the waiting lounge you can play a good game though, you just have to set it up on the chair while you sit on the ground. Or you could even invite the people around you to play poker or something. It’s a good way to break the ice and playing blackjack is always a fun game or if you really want to get to know people real fast and cure the boredom, play snap.

Or extreme snap, which is something that my brother and I invented in a particularly boring airport. Basic rules of snap still apply, except when you see a snap, you may be the first one to plonk your hand on it, it doesn’t mean those cards are yours. The other players are all allowed to try and snatch them from you. Which means the entire time the game is running you can be trying to snap, hold onto the cards in your hands and trying to grab the other players cards as well.

Probably not a good idea to play extreme snap with people you just met, but if you have travel buddies with you than extreme snap is always a good idea.

Play hide and seek

It’s totally childish, but it really is a lot of fun. Works best if you have a few travel buddies with you or have the ability to get complete strangers to join in, but when you manage it, it eats up a lot of time. Especially if you play it in Singapore Changi Airport – that place is huge and searching all over the place you could never find your travel buddy.

Make sure to have a time limit however, as you could end up missing your flight, and that is never a good idea.

Also if you find yourself alone you could always play hide and seek with the people around you, they don’t even have to know you are playing a game with them as you constantly duck around and away from them.

Find a bench

Having exhausted all the above methods if you are still bored and still have a long time to go, maybe now is a good time to curl up on a bench somewhere and watch TV.

Not all of the airports have TV, but most do, and if no one is looking you can change the channel and curl up and watch your final bit of TV for awhile.

Surf the web

In a brilliant move by the airports, a lot of the transit terminals in the airports have free Internet, doted all around. Even though they tell you only to jump on for fifteen minutes at a time if you have an early flight, or a late one, no one is ever around and you can stay on there until you have to go to your gate.

Hopefully by now you are either not at all bored, playing hide and seek or extreme snap with a bunch of strangers, cruising the net or are currently bugging someone, or even better are now waiting in line to board the plane.

Well done, I hope these have kept your occupied, though I have to ask, what are some of the ways you have kept from being totally bored in an airport?

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